Cool Leaf Mirror-Style Flat Panel Keyboard

This is one cool keyboard that doesn’t look like a keyboard but more of a flat mirror with an LED display. The Cool Leaf by Minebea of Japan is a flat panel mirror-looking keyboard equipped with a touch-sensitive display as its primary input.

The plus of having a keyboard that’s totally flat is that nothing, not even dust and food crumbs can ever get between the keys. That’s also for liquids, one of the worse enemies of the keyboard which has the ability to cripple a computer system due to a moment of carelessness.

Even if such a keyboard happens to get dirty, a quick wipe will be enough to get rid of stuff like fingerprints and dust off the surface.

A cool-looking keyboard for those who are obsessed with hygiene, and also for places such as hospitals and clinics. However, the lack of tactile feedback on a touch-sensitive keyboard like this will need some getting used to especially for seasoned touch-typists. For some, this drawback is only a small sacrifice but not a major deterrence for the sake of aesthetics.

Watch the video of the Cool Leaf keyboard in action below:

The Cool Leaf flat panel mirror keyboard comes with a USB connector and is designed to work with Windows OSes. It is slated to debut on May 13, 2011 in Japan at an estimated price of 26,000 yen.